


To Take, To Hold

by queenlua



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Breathplay, Choking, Fluff and Smut, Hand Jobs, Kink Meme, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:38:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24660175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenlua/pseuds/queenlua
Summary: With any other partner, this discovery would simply be another fact, a useful tidbit, one of many which could be used to tease or torment them on some later occasion.  And itwasthat.But this wasn’t just anyone.  This wasClaude, the most infuriatingly giving partner Lorenz had ever had.  Claude, whose answer to “What would you like?” was only ever, “What wouldyoulike?”  Claude, who had never shared asinglefilthy kink with Lorenz, even though he’d teased out a dozen of his own.***Claude likes being choked.  Lorenz wants him to return the favor.
Relationships: Lorenz Hellman Gloucester/Claude von Riegan
Comments: 32
Kudos: 136





	To Take, To Hold

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Three Houses kinkmeme. [Original prompt here.](https://3houseskinkmeme.dreamwidth.org/476.html?thread=521948#cmt521948)
> 
> Thanks to printers_devil for the beta.

Lorenz discovered Claude’s little kink almost by accident.

It happened while they were having what Claude oh-so-gratingly called “tent sex”—the sort of ragged, filthy, highly improvisational sex they resorted to while they were out on missions.

Back at Garreg Mach, Lorenz insisted on a certain standard for their trysts. They both needed to be properly bathed, for starters; it drove Lorenz absolutely mad how many officers found it acceptable to walk around stinking of sweat and blood when the showers were _right there_. And none of this “quick and dirty” business for Lorenz. If they were having sex there would be proper foreplay, with some incense lit to set the mood, and a good, long block of time set aside for the occassion.

On the road, however, things were necessarily more... primitive.

For some goddessforsaken reason Claude had pitched their tent on a hillside, babbling about how it would be such a lovely spot for watching the sunrise, and the hill was only a _little_ slanted so it wouldn’t be a problem—except, of course it was. Lorenz had been asleep for maybe ten minutes when Claude shifted in his sleep, and rolled right down the hill, toppling into Lorenz. Lorenz shoved him away, which of course woke Claude up. Then Claude rolled down the hill again—but on _purpose_ this time, with an insufferable grin.

So Lorenz wriggled out of his bedroll, and rolled Claude back up the hill, pinning him with his hands and knees. Which Claude took as a challenge, and he squirmed out from under Lorenz’s grasp to pin him back. Except, Claude lost his balance, and the two of them went tumbling again—

—and after that, it was hard to tell whether they were wrestling, or simply engaging in the most unnecessarily flailing form of foreplay Lorenz had ever experienced. And in the limbs-everywhere tangle, Lorenz toppled onto Claude, and clumsily braced his hands on Claude’s neck.

It was an accident, of course, and Lorenz hastily pulled his hands away.

But Claude met Lorenz’s eyes, and grabbed Lorenz’s wrists, and slid Lorenz’s hands back towards Claude’s own neck, holding them there. Claude’s eyes were bright, arresting Lorenz in place. The tangling and toppling was done, and now there was this: just the two of them, staring at each other, with Claude’s pulse beating right beneath his hands. Lorenz frowned, uncertain, as he spread his fingers, and wrapped them feather-light around Claude’s neck—

“Like that,” Claude breathed, in an ardent tone that Lorenz had never heard before.

And Goddess, that look, those eyes, Lorenz couldn’t possibly resist when Claude was looking at him like that—eyelids heavy, strands of hair falling across his face, his lips curled around the word _please_ —

“Like this?” Lorenz clarified, tightening his grip a little bit at a time. He didn’t want to go too far, didn’t want to hurt him—but Claude’s eyes only ever said _go on, go on_ , so go on he did, until he could hear Claude’s breaths tightening beneath him, heard them become whispery little wheezes. Lorenz loosened his grasp for a moment, just to be certain—“ _Gods_ , yes,” Claude gasped, and caught his breath. He rolled his head back, closing his eyes for one moment of bliss—and then he swiveled his head with a sharp stare. _So are you going to do it again or what?_

Well. Lorenz couldn’t say no to _that._

What followed afterwards was still tent sex, a great graceless imbroglio. But from the way Claude moaned as he came, in a keening pitch Lorenz had never heard before, and from the way he lay there afterward, shuddering and muttering a hundred wonderfully insensible things—Lorenz knew that, for Claude, it had been something else entirely.

_Fascinating._

With any other partner, this would simply be another fact, a useful tidbit, one of many which could be used to tease or torment them on some later occasion. And it was that.

But this wasn’t just anyone. This was _Claude_ , the most infuriatingly giving partner Lorenz had ever had. Claude, whose answer to “What would you like?” was only ever, “What would _you_ like?” Claude, who had never shared a _single_ filthy kink with Lorenz, even though he’d teased out a dozen of his own.

Which was nice, in its way. Certainly during the feverish first month of their—courtship? fling? furious lovemaking in-between Roundtable meetings? blowing off steam while the whole Alliance threatened to collapse around them? whatever you called that—during that first month, Lorenz been entirely too distracted by Claude’s blisteringly handsome eyes, and the lovely firm way that Claude would stroke his cock, and that unfairly magnificent thing he did with his tongue, to worry overmuch as to what Claude was getting out of their torrid little exchanges.

And around the time their thing had transmogrified into something more tangibly relationship-shaped (a conversation they’d been gang-pressed into when Hilda had cheerfully asked the pair of them over lunch, “So you two are like, _doing it_ , right?”)—only then did Lorenz start to realize how terribly rude he’d been. Just because Claude had seemed so eager to accost him didn’t mean Lorenz couldn’t have returned the favor a bit more. A minor sexual identity crisis and a _major_ familial loyalty crisis was no excuse.

So of course he sought to amend the fault immediately, and asked Claude if he would like anything in particular, for the Goddess knew he’d accommodated some rather offbeat requests of his own—but Claude, of course, only answered with a coy little, “What would _you_ like, Lorenz?”

_Maddening._

So Lorenz had been giddy to discover this one little secret of Claude von Riegan’s. He found himself a little obsessed, honestly—because if that was the only thing Claude had ever asked for, it must truly feel like something.

Lorenz had never contemplated trying something like that before—he was bossy in bed, rather than rough—but for the next two weeks, while Claude was away on another mission without him, and Lorenz was left alone at Garreg Mach, he could hardly think of anything else. How it felt for him. How it felt for Claude.

How it would feel for Claude to do it to _him._

And so the instant Claude returned, before the man even had a chance to change out of his clothes from the journey, Lorenz pulled him into his room, pinned him against the wall, greeted him with a long and gloriously senseless kiss, and said, with a mocking smile:

“Welcome back, dear leader. I have a request for you.”

Claude’s eyes glittered. “Ask away.”

Lorenz grabbed Claude’s hands, and pulled them to rest on his own neck. “I’d like you to choke me, for a change.”

Claude yanked his hands away, as if from a hot stove. “No.”

For a moment Lorenz was speechless. Claude had never said _no_ to anything Lorenz had asked before. Not that Claude wasn’t allowed to say no, of course. But Claude was so giving that some months ago, Lorenz had started asking for outrageous things, as a test, just to see how far Claude would go—and thus far, Claude had won the resulting games of chicken several times over. Mere _reciprocity_ didn’t seem like the thing that would stop Claude cold.

“Why not?” Lorenz managed at last. “I’ve done it for you.”

Claude wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I don’t want to make things complicated.”

“So long as you are fucking _me_ ,” Lorenz huffed, “I am sorry to say, I will continue to make things complicated.”

Claude laughed. “Gods, you’re such a brat.”

Claude leaned into kiss him then, and well, Lorenz could hardly help kissing back—a mite too enthusiastically, even. He had been gone for so long, and Lorenz had missed this so much—

Claude was trying to distract him. Lorenz could tell, because he was touching him every single place that Claude knew he liked to be touched—running a hand through his hair, over the arch of his ears, gliding his fingers down the back of his spine with just a hint of nail. Lorenz shivered, and he shivered again as Claude breathed into Lorenz’s ear, and stepped around behind him, and hugged him close, and oh, Lorenz did like that.

Then Claude’s hands drifted southward, reaching out to rub him through the crotch of his pants—pleasant in its own way, but after a few minutes Lorenz grew annoyed at the indirection of it. He’d been waiting for _half a month_. “Let’s simplify this, shall we?”

Lorenz pulled Claude onto the bed, undid his own belt, tugged his pants off, and tossed them aside—making a little shivery noise as he did so. He was already unbearably hard.

Claude didn’t strip himself, not yet. He just sat there grinning, his _I’m enjoying the view_ smile, the one that always simultaneously thrilled and mortified Lorenz. He felt himself flush—and he felt himself grow even harder.

Then Claude was around him again, reaching from behind to caress Lorenz’s chest, before sliding slowly downward... to Lorenz’s hip, to the inside of his thigh, cupping his balls, rubbing the inside of his thigh again...

_“Claude.”_

“What, that’s not where you want me?”

Lorenz rolled his eyes, grabbed Claude’s hand, and moved it onto his cock. Claude took hold of it only lightly, but even that little touch made Lorenz catch his breath. Then Claude took a finger and dragged it slowly from the base up the shaft. One finger, then two—his fingers flicked across the head and Lorenz gasped. And at last, Claude gave an experimental tug, and Lorenz heard a rather ungentlemanly whine wrested from his throat.

“So needy,” Claude whispered in Lorenz’s ear. And, Goddess, he really liked that.

But then Lorenz remembered: he had come with an agenda, a plan, and he would not have Claude _thwarting_ it. “Darling,” Lorenz said, his voice syrupy-sweet as he took Claude’s hand and pulled it away from him. “You didn’t answer my question.”

It was a little hard to focus, with Claude’s chest still pressed against his back, and Claude’s breath in his ear, but Lorenz was nothing if not determined. He waited.

Claude _hmm_ ed. He was considering.

Lorenz clucked his tongue impatiently.

Then Claude muttered something that sounded like a swear, and stepped off the bed, and crossed the room and picked up a little statue from the dresser.

“Here,” Claude said, shoving the statuette into Lorenz’s palm. “Hold onto that. And if it’s too much, if you can’t breathe, if you want my hands off your neck for _any_ reason—you drop it, okay?”

“Certainly.”

And Lorenz felt gravity shift, in that moment. Before, the two of them were on level ground. Now, everything in the room tilted oh-so-slightly towards Claude. Claude, whose smile had turned wolfish. Claude, who never did anything halfwise.

Oh, heavens.

“On your back,” Claude said. When Lorenz only blinked, Claude repeated, “On your back,” with an edge in his voice sharp enough to cut.

Lorenz fell back. And Claude leaned over him, lifting one knee onto the bed, then two, straddling him as he stared down at Lorenz. “What’s this still doing on?” Claude laughed, tugging at Lorenz’s shirt—tugging hard enough that Lorenz had to scramble to pull it off before Claude tore it. “That’s _cashmere_ , Claude, be _careful_ —”

Then Claude’s hands flew to his throat.

Lorenz had asked for this, of course, but he hadn’t expected it quite so soon. He stiffened, bracing himself—and then he realized Claude was hardly choking him at all. More like digging his fingers into the side of his neck. A little psych-out. It wasn’t even particularly uncomfortable.

Claude slid his hands aside, grinning wide. “You seem jumpy, Lorenz. Sure you’re up for this?”

Lorenz swallowed. Claude’s question was a taunt, and ordinarily Lorenz would have responded most vociferously, but—well. Unfortunately, that little taunt allowed Lorenz to pause long enough to think—to think properly, with the _proper_ head. And what he thought was: wasn’t this arrangement rather symbolically fraught? reputationally hazardous? He, Lorenz Hellman Gloucester, getting choked out by the Alliance leader in his own bedroom?

Of course Lorenz knew this was sex, and it wasn’t like he was _actually_ baring his throat to the Alliance leader—except, in a rather literal sense, he absolutely _was_. And that touch of danger was alluring, of course—neither Lorenz nor his present erection could deny that—but, well, this was the man who’d mustered troops against Gloucester not even six months previous, the man Lorenz was technically keeping tabs on for the good of the Alliance, so perhaps some restraint was in order—

—and, oh, Lorenz was overthinking this. He could tell because, when Claude just barely grazed the back of Lorenz’s knee with one deft little finger, his thoughts scattered apart like cheap pottery. Lorenz flattened his leg out with a little huff, to rid himself of the distraction. 

Which made Claude’s smile flicker. “You good?” he asked, and his gaze shifted towards the hand where Lorenz held the statuette—

“Of course I am,” Lorenz answered, with an ignoble surge of indignation, and damn the symbolism. “Are you _playing_ with me, Claude von Riegan?”

“Not playing. I was just offering a little preview.” Claude’s smile was back, and he was still standing on his knees, staring down at Lorenz—leering, really. The way Claude’s eyes glittered reminded him, uncomfortably, that every inch of him was naked, while Claude was still fully-clothed.

“On your stomach,” Claude commanded, after a moment’s consideration.

Lorenz rolled himself over, shivering at that voice—then shivered again as Claude slapped him straight across the buttocks. Then Lorenz heard a drawer slide open, and the little pop of a jar opening, heard Claude slicking something onto his hand, and then— _yes_ —Claude ran his fingers down Lorenz’s spine with one hand, as the other hand slid a finger into him. 

And Goddess, just that one finger already felt amazing; he shivered at the coolness of the touch. Claude’s other hand roved all over him, every place Claude knew he liked to be touched, his nails dragging along the curve of his shoulder blades, and up and down his spine, and between that and the finger-fucking, Lorenz grew so hard that he started to whine. He tried rubbing himself clumsily against the bed, bucking his hips—then Claude moved a firm hand to press down, just at the base of his spine, so he couldn’t even do _that._

Lorenz _liked_ this Claude, he realized, even as he groaned underneath the hand bearing him down. Not that—not that Claude wasn’t usually a diverting partner, of course he was, they’d been at it long enough—but the trouble with Claude was, he was just as inscrutable in the bedroom as he was out of it. Lorenz could never _quite_ tell what it was Claude wanted, and more than once, he’d finished with a nagging feeling that Claude was masking some small dissatisfaction under that false smile of his, despite all his mellifluous reassurances to the contrary, had been left wanting—

But this?

This, without a doubt, was a Claude who _wanted_ something.

And surely it was a noble thing, to indulge that? some part of Lorenz reasoned. Especially after how much Claude had indulged him in the past? Perhaps the symbolism here wasn’t so fraught after all—

“On your back,” Claude said.

Lorenz rolled back over, and from the undercurrent in Claude’s voice he guessed this was the moment, Claude would start choking him soon—and that twitchy anticipation must’ve shown on his face, because Claude started laughing. “Gods, Lorenz, you must be really into this.” And when Lorenz didn’t answer right off, he gripped Lorenz’s hip tight with one hand, and shoved a second finger in with the other.

Lorenz gasped, and Claude’s spare hand once again gallivanted everywhere except where Lorenz wanted it most—and, then Claude’s hand went there, too, wrapping neatly around his still-erect penis. The combination of that one hand pumping him in the front, and the fingers still penetrating him from behind, was already divine, and Claude knew how to squeeze _just_ tight enough to make him gasp—but Lorenz had come here with a plan, he remembered, briefly, fleetingly. “You haven’t—forgotten—my request?” he panted.

“Of course I haven’t. Good things come to those who wait,” Claude answered, singsong. And, well, Lorenz wasn’t in much of a position to argue, seeing as it’d taken a tremendous effort to pant out even that much. So he could only hope that Claude would get to it, before he came, because it would be such a _bother_ to have to wait all over again—

As if on cue, both hands stopped. Claude, still straddling Lorenz, slid closer, so that his knees pressed against Lorenz’s hips. And at last Claude wrapped both his hands around Lorenz’s neck, cool to the touch. Lorenz shivered a bit, and felt his heart leap in his chest, but didn’t flinch this time. He was far too eager, by now, to flinch away.

Except—Lorenz realized, after a moment, that he could still breathe. Not as clearly, but still. “Is that all?” Lorenz taunted.

Claude’s eyes flashed. But he didn’t rise to the taunt, not right off, not the way Lorenz would. Instead he let himself smile, and he tightened his fingers slowly—so slowly that Lorenz didn’t notice it until minutes later, didn’t notice until the pressure just started to feel uncomfortable, and Claude’s fingers were still tightening, as steady and inexorable as the movement of an iceberg. Lorenz closed his hand around the statuette tighter, felt that it was still there—and let his eyes close, felt the blood rushing through his head, felt his head growing heavy. Then Claude released.

“That’s more like it,” Lorenz murmured, after a quick gasp.

“Yeah?” Claude said, and did it again. The cool fingers, the agonizingly slow tightening, Lorenz’s breaths coming faster and tighter the whole while, a jittery moment of nothing—

So I _do_ enjoy this sort of thing, Lorenz thought, a little deliriously, as he felt himself growing harder with every little gasp. So hard that when Claude, without warning, reached and stroked his finger up the bottom side of his penis, and flicked it over his frenulum, Lorenz’s whole body shivered.

“So needy,” Claude murmured, wrapping a hand around Lorenz’s cock, smiling devilishly.

For a while, it went on like that: Claude alternating between strangling him, and jerking him off, leaving Lorenz panting either way—either panting for breath, or panting with need. Never quite enough to make Lorenz drop the statuette. Never quite enough to make him come, even though he ached for it.

_Claude von Riegan, if you don’t make me come this instant—_

—is what Lorenz would’ve normally said. But Lorenz couldn’t say anything; there was never enough time between gasps. For a moment Lorenz thought about dropping the statuette, just so he could tell Claude, _get on with it_. But Claude would laugh, and probably use that as an excuse to take even longer, the horrible wretch, he _so_ liked to tease—

Then, quite unexpectedly, Claude did loosen his grip—but, only so he could lower one hand and resume fingering his ass. So Lorenz did catch his breath, but only long enough to moan something insensible.

“You look like such a mess right now,” Claude said, laughing, reaching out and ruffling Lorenz’s hair. And Lorenz could tell from the breathlessness in Claude’s voice that Claude was growing just as impatient as he.

Claude gave Lorenz a moment to catch his breath, during which Lorenz could do nothing but lie there, and pant, and watch the ceiling spinning above him. Claude was humming some little tune as he rubbed more lubricant onto his fingers. But after a moment, Claude glanced sidelong at Lorenz’s right hand—still wrapped in a fist around the statuette—and laughed. “Well, if you insist.”

Then Claude wrapped his left hand around Lorenz’s throat, while his right hand resumed finger-fucking him apace. Was Claude’s stranglehold tighter than before? Lorenz wondered. Or was this tingling in all his limbs merely the cumulative effect of this whole experience? The subsequent fumbling few minutes of widening, and lubricating, and fingering passed in something like a blur to Lorenz—there was only the briefest of pauses, as Claude moved to wrestle his way out of his own pants, and pulled out his own cock.

Then Claude’s hand was on Lorenz’s throat again, and things went blurry for Lorenz again, though of course Claude’s first thrust was unmistakable, and a little gasp escaped him then even through Claude’s vicegrip. And once Claude was in, the hand that had been fingering him, instead drifted up to stroke his penis, and oh, _oh._

From there, things seemed to move very fast indeed, though it was impossible to tell whether they were fast, or if they only seemed that way, because of how oddly faraway everything was starting to feel. Lorenz couldn’t feel the bedsheets beneath him, couldn’t make out whatever Claude was moaning or muttering, could only barely make out the light in the room—truly, the only sensations left him were Claude’s clasp around his throat, and Claude thrusting inside him, and Claude’s other hand stroking his cock.

The only other time Lorenz had felt this sort of focus was on the battlefield, and that of course wasn’t nearly so pleasant a circumstance—Goddess, he should’ve tried this ages ago.

It was hard for Claude to be as precise with one hand as he’d been with two, and each time he thrusted, his hand pressed hard into Lorenz’s neck, and Lorenz found himself gagging and sputtering. And so Lorenz felt it, when Claude came—felt it in his ass, but also in how Claude’s grip on his throat tightened, pressing down on him.

Then, with hardly a pause, Claude’s free hand resumed stroking Lorenz’s cock, which had already been rock hard for the better part of an hour—he came so fast that Lorenz could hear himself sputtering as he tried to cry out. And as he came, he saw spots in his eyes, and the room around him felt faraway, as though he were floating somewhere just above it. The blood rushing through his head sounded like a roar, the pressure in his skull like a vise, and he felt himself spasming with panic— _breathe, breathe, breathe_ , every part of him seemed to scream, every part of him except for his hand, which held fast around the statuette from sheer stubbornness. Lorenz was long spent, but still Claude’s grip was still holding fast—

Then, the next moment, the hold was gone.

Lorenz sucked in a huge, hungry breath. His head was still heavy, and he had a vague sense of having just done something quite stupid, something he’d be mortified about later. But right now there was air, sweet air, and it tasted _divine_ —only a hair shy of the bliss he’d experienced moments prior.

Lorenz basked in it, lying back and closing his eyes. The brightness of the room was too much for him, right at this moment. He only wanted to rest—

But Claude was shaking his shoulder, for some reason, and saying... something, it just sounded like noise to him, and it was all terribly distracting. Claude knew that Lorenz preferred not to be touched at all for some minutes after coming. Ordinarily he’d swat Claude’s hand away, but his fingers didn’t feel quite real again, yet, still tingling all over.

“What’s wrong?” Lorenz asked at last, voice blurry.

“Lorenz!” Claude shouted, loud enough to make Lorenz wince. “Why didn’t you drop it? I—I counted on you dropping it.”

Lorenz’s head was still spinning. Heavens, he wished Claude wouldn’t shout. It was going to give him a headache. “What?”

“Th-The statue, the thing in your hand—” Claude forced Lorenz’s fist open, yanked the statuette away, and held it up in Lorenz’s face. “I told you to drop this if you couldn’t breathe for too long. Why didn’t you drop it?”

Lorenz arched a brow. “Because I was experiencing an unparalleled moment of bliss?”

“You... you were?”

“Yes. Why on _earth_ would I willingly cut that short?”

“Oh.” Claude’s expression eased somewhat, though his eyebrows were still sharp.

Lorenz was starting to come down. He could feel his fingers again. He wriggled them experimentally. He looked at Claude, who was—not looking at him, not anymore. He was staring at the wall, and though Lorenz could only make out part of his face, from where he lay, what he saw seemed... grim. Brooding. Not at all a face he liked to see on Claude after something like that.

Lorenz pushed himself upright. “Claude, are you quite alright?”

“Sorry, I.” He drew a slow, steadying breath. “I thought I’d hurt you.”

“Well, you didn’t.” The fact seemed so obvious that Lorenz didn’t know why he was even stating it. His come was on the _bed_ , for heaven’s sake, that was the clearest sign of a good time that Lorenz knew. But Claude wasn’t looking at him; he was looking at the wall, holding his hands interlocked in front of him, squeezing them together so tight that Lorenz could see his knuckles whitening.

And that made Lorenz queasy, because that was the little tic Claude had at war council meetings, whenever he was staring down some preposterously mismatched troop numbers, and puzzling out some method to keep them all alive. It was the thing Claude did whenever he was cornered and his schemes were starting to run short. And this bedroom was no proper place for any feelings like that.

“Claude, I didn’t mean to push you into anything,” Lorenz said at last. “If you didn’t want to choke me of course you didn’t have to, and if you didn’t want to explain I had thought you would just tell me _no can do, Lorenz!_ You know, the way you do every single time I dare ask about the rationale behind your more absurd war room gambits.”

Claude drew a shaky breath. “I didn’t say no because I didn’t think I’d like it. I knew I would like it.” Claude’s voice was so faint that Lorenz had to lean closer, just to hear him. Claude was looking up at the ceiling. “I was, uhm. I was worried I’d like it too much.”

Lorenz scowled. Whatever could that mean? It was sex, the whole _point_ was things you would like. He wants things; everyone wants things; what was the trouble with that?

And that made Lorenz wonder how much Claude wanted that he never dared to name. Wondered just how much he really hid behind all those times he’d asked _what would you like?_

Maybe he’d never really know all of Claude—and Lorenz felt an stab of melancholy like a lance, at that thought. But at least he knew this much:

“I’m fine,” Lorenz said, grabbing Claude’s hand. He gave it a fierce little squeeze. “I am absolutely fine, Claude.”

Claude gave a coarse laugh, _heh heh_ , the kind he gave when he was humoring you.

“Look at me,” Lorenz snapped, and when Claude didn’t turn his head immediately, Lorenz grabbed Claude’s chin and turned it for him. He _was_ a brat, precisely for occasions such as this—when it mattered. “Read my lips. I am absolutely fine.”

He held Claude’s gaze until Claude, at last, nodded his head.

“We can go more slowly, next time,” Lorenz said, more softly. “Or not at all, of course, heaven knows there are plenty of other sordid things I’d like you to do to me—”

“Slow sounds good,” Claude said, with a little hiccough. “Because, um. Excepting the part where I thought maybe I’d killed you? That really _was_ the best lay of my life.”

Lorenz’s eyes narrowed into slits. “You always say that.”

Claude laughed. “Because it’s always true!”

“Claude. Need I remind you of the night before Gronder?”

Claude shrugged. “Still came.”

“There was mud _everywhere_. There were _ants._ I got a _rash._ ”

“Maybe I’m into that.”

Lorenz rolled his eyes.

“Hey! It was still another night I got to have sex with you, right?”

“You are being positively treacly, now.”

Claude batted his eyelids. “Shnookums.”

“Enough,” Lorenz said, laughing, falling back against the pillows, “you’ll give me a toothache. And—be a dear and light some incense, would you?” Which ordinarily, Lorenz would’ve done himself, well before doing all the rest of it, but, well—well, maybe it was fine to let his standards slip. Just this one time.


End file.
